Iran says it has successfully launched its first satellite into orbit using domestic technology. The launch, while expected, will be seen by some in the West as confirming the view that Iran could have nuclear-tipped intercontinental missiles relatively soon.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad receives news of the successful …

Black Arrow

A British launch vehicle that placed a British satellite into orbit in 1971, making the UK the 6th nation to launch its own satellite. Cancelled by the Heath government, the scientists at Woomera launched the last vehicle anyway (by some accounts with permission ...) thus making the UK the first nation to give up a satellite launching capability :((

Correction

Britain has independently put a satellite in orbit. On 28 October 1971 a Black Arrow rocket put the Prospero X-3 satellite in orbit from Woomera, Australia making Britain the 6th nation to place a satellite in orbit.

I was at the site on the Isle of Wight this September where the rockets were tested before being shipped out to Australia. It's right next to the Needles, a great case of what might have been, if only the funding hadn't been cut, just at the moment of success...

Are you sure?

"With the launch, Iran joins a select group of nations able to put objects into orbit around the Earth. The UK, for instance, has never built a rocket capable of doing this, has no civil space launching capability, and is reliant on US-supplied Trident missiles to carry its nuclear weapons."

Can i refer you to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Arrow

and also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_first_orbital_launches_by_country

The uk has launched a satellite into orbit

Wrong, what about Prospero X-3?

As per the title, we did it 5th... It wasn't launched from the UK, but the article says we've never built a rocket capable of putting objects in orbit. Clearly we have, and a long time before most other people.

Say it ain't so!

Brits in Space

Wrong!!!! Britain put a satellite in orbit in the 1970s called Prospero, launched by Black Arrow. Due to the short sightedness of those in Westminster this ability was abandoned, along with Blue Streak, ELDO, Black Prince, RZ2, Gamma Eight and Bristol Stentor engines. Our time will come again - look for Skylon and Lapcat on the internet!

Addendum...

Not forgetting of course the Blue Streak 1st stage to the aborted Europa launcher... worked every time, it was the french, german and italian bits that kept breaking...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Streak_missile

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_rocket

Can I suggest Lewis, that at lunchtime you take yourself off to the Science Museum in South Kensington and have a good look at the the space gallery, as the forth Black Arrow, R4, is on display there, together with a mock up of Prospero, the original of which incidentally is still in orbit and functioning...

@Colin MacLean

"Nuclear tipped warheads"

What does this mean? Presumably a payload which was to cause a nuclear explosion would be a "nuclear warhead". Is a "nuclear tipped warhead" a conventional warhead with a radioactive payload - a dirty bomb?

I still think the chances of Iran managing to make any sort of fission bomb, let alone H-bomb, which actually goes bang are about zero.

@ WarrenG

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction

...and have punished Mordechai Vanunu, the person who made this public...

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mordechai_Vanunu

He cannot leave Israel or talk to journalists and is effectively under state arrest.

I'm afraid no one needs a kick up the arse. Pakistan is the only Islamic state to have tested, working weapons; with them, India, North Korea and Israel are the only nations who have nuclear weapons outside the NPT.

The existence of other nations' development efforts needs careful verification before a US/UK strike because of the fiasco of WMD in Iraq. Of course, the US could simply ask Israel to carry out a strike and then later block any Security Council effort reprimanding them. Presidents change, those who bankroll Senators in the US do not.

Any independent corroberation?

Has anyone other than the Iranians tracked the satellite yet?

They wouldn't be the first country to claim to have put something into orbit but failed to do so. In 1998, North Korea, that other workers' paradise, claimed to have orbited Kwangmyongsong-1 playing proletarian toe-tappers such as "Song of General Kim Il Sung" and "Song of General Kim Jong Il". Despite millions of people twiddling their radio knobs to pick up these heady tunes, not a whisper was ever heard and it is believed that the launch was either just a missile test or that the satellite never reached orbital velocity.

Speaking of our fun-loving Stalinist friends, I see they're planning on making things in Asia just a bit more exciting than they were already:

Buck up Engerland!

You may not have a viable launch vehicle, or a space program to speak of, but can Iran lay claim to the Series II Landrover or the Harrison marine chronometer? Hell no!

For every potential Iranian Astronaut leaping child-like across the moon's surface beneath the earthrise, there must be a hundred weathered farm folk trundling unstoppably across England's green and pleasant lands at the helm of the redoubtable Series II and god knows how many tall ships bringing the mother country rum and exotic root vegetables from the mysterious West Indies without fear of winding up in Ibiza!

It may not have the glamour or drama of re-entry but how many swaledales can you fit in the back of a Soyuz? Not enough, my friends, even if you only bring along a small plutocrat. But a Landrover? A man need never leave the flock behind with a Landrover!

I think this is great news.

Maybe the fatheads at NASA will pull their thumbs out of their arses and actually get some work done putting the AWESOME back into rocket technology. And what is it with Barack Obama's comments? Whiny, moaning bobbins, he hasn't got a clue. If he wants to put some cash into his economy he should be investing in a proper space programme.

Russia, China, Richard Branson and now Iran. The space race is back on, daddio.

UK Satellite launch

The first (and last!) satellite successfully put into orbit on a UK designed and built rocket was Prospero and was launched on a Black Arrow rocket a programme that was then suspended. If you are a really sad individual you can still listen to Prospero's signals I believe ...

Astrium anybody?

Considering a significant amount of Astrium's rocket building is done in the UK, it seems a bit strange to say that Britain has no rocket building capability, i suppose that by the same token Germany, France, Italy and the whole of Europe do not have any rocket capability right??

I think we all know thats a lot of bollocks. Europe shares its resources in order to be the worlds biggest supplier of commercial rocket launches. So stop bemoaning the fact that your not doing it on your own. Or get off your ass contact your local MP and start harrassing him to get him to start pushing for a homegrown program if you think its that important...

named "Omid" (Hope)

RE: Frank Bough

"the BBC managed to massively patronise the Iranians this morning describing their satellite as "homemade"....." Well, seeing as it is actually built with Russian, Chinese, North Korean and Pakistani tech, it really is a homemade copy of existing tech. So El Beeb were being quite generous in even calling it "homemade".

"....Presumably these twats have no idea that Great Britain has never achieved such a thing...." And I presume you now feel like the complete tw@ you most obvioulsy are having seen all the posts about Prospero and Black Arrow. Hope that humble pie doesn't stick too badly in your throat.

"....Well done Iran. I only wish our aggression towards you and your idiotic theocracy would end. In that order." Yes, we have threatened to "wipe Iran off the map", "start a new holocaust" and promise "to drive the Iranians into the sea" at regular intervals. Oh, hold on a sec, no we haven't, but Iran has used the political football of the Israeli-Palistinian conflict to promote war and threaten exactly those events on Israel.

This is of course all the more rich given that there are large numbers of the Iranian populance with no running water or mains electricity, very little if any education, and a level of healthcare that makes the NHS look good I'm sure they appreciate their taxes being ploughed into grandiose projects which only increase he chances of a war.

Sick of this... cheer up Lewis.

Been reading this site for years, and never made a comment. Now, I'm driven to make the first a flame (hopefully a sane one)...

Mr Page, do you not get sick of being so utterly miserable about everything the UK has ever done, is doing, or might at some point do? Were you aware of the Black Arrow/Prospero launch, or does it not count in some way?

Besides, the UK retains an launch facility through ESA/Arianespace. Yes, we can all get nationalistic about the fact we share this stuff with France et al, but thats an argument which defies economics.

Is it not hypocritical to constantly slate the UK defense establishment for not buying better overseas products at expense to homemade ones, whilst ignoring successful examples of buying into a better shared service?

Why, also, does an article about Iran need to include a poorly researched stab at the UK? Keep to the bloody point and, please, cheer up.

Something about Iran and nuclear

Iran is a Shia country and stick to what their clerics say. Their clerics have said that nuclear weapons are completely forbidden in Shia Islam. Therefore they will not be doing nuclear weapons, they only want to use nuclear for power usage. Just like in the UK the government wants to go down the nuclear route as they have decided that "nuclear is green".

So, in summary, Iran do not want to build nuclear weapons as it has been strictly forbidden for them by their religious courts. So stop all this nonsense about Iran building nuclear weapons.

Make your mind up

Is this the same Lewis, criticising the UK for not having space launch capability ('cos that'd save the economy right now, oh yes!), who is forever berating UK.gov for building it's own aircraft carriers and fighter aircraft instead of buying in foreign tech more cheaply??

And is it me or does the Iranian pres ALWAYS look like he's wearing suits two sizes too big, and bought from his brother-in-law's cousin's shop in Brick Lane?

Just like the world cup

British rocketry

May only be fiction, but *somebody* has to mention Fred and Geoffrey Hoyle, "Rockets in Ursa Major" - fictional British space program set in the days after the Second World War, complete with handlebar moustaches. They don't make 'em like they used to - but dammit they used to!

Brit Sattelite Still in Orbit After 30 Years

I'm sure I recall the launch of a UK satellite on a UK rocket - Blue Streak, I think - In the 60's and still in orbit now.

Your article is a wonderful view into the educational background of those in the media. This gem certainly sits alonside the "Reefs" horror put on screen by the BBC during the recent Rememberance Day TV coverage .